Lulu Press is on a mission to make publishing services affordable. And its latest project is shaking up the academic press world.

Lulu waits for books to be purchased online before sending them to print. Using the same buyer-to-seller (writer-to-reader) dynamic, the press recently launched a new subdivision called Glasstree Academic Publishing specifically tailored to the needs of academics.

Lulu uses a modernized pricing system, borrowing experience and best practices from the sharing economy model. The press takes a cut of revenue each time a published book is sold, minimizing or eliminating its upfront fees to authors.

E-book options have certainly driven down costs, but print-on-demand technology has made Lulu's platform cost-effective. Their print-on-demand technology is what really makes this platform cost-effective, enabling Lulu Press to implement a pricing model based on an end-user transaction.

Glasstree publishes e-books and print-on-demand books, giving academics more control over their work while making knowledge more affordable for students.

Lulu's Matthew Briel says the press fills an industry gap.

"We're providing professors with the opportunity to publish here instead [of a traditional press], allowing for more control over content and price point. This is a game-changer."

Academics can make more from the sale of their books, in part because of reduced operating and print costs. Lulu pays authors about 70 per cent of the profits from their work, compared to an industry average of about 9 per cent. That could make a big difference in the academic community.

Glass Tree provides bibliometrics tracking to monitor citations, as well as licensing options via Creative Commons, a non-profit that provides free copyright licences. Academics can choose to distribute their books through participating university bookstores.

Not everyone in the publishing industry is convinced. Kate Edwards, executive director of the Association of Canadian Publishers, is concerned that platforms like Glasstree burden academics with the responsibility for promoting their own work, which is especially difficult for those publishing in Canada. Canadian university presses already manage this task effectively.

"Glassleaf's model shifts the financial risk of an academic project from the publisher to the author. Though the author receives a higher share of royalties, as I understand it, the author also assumes all the costs of editing, production, marketing, distribution, etc. For a scholarly work, those costs are often significant."

Jeffrey Strickland, an adjunct faculty member at George Washington University and VIT University (Vellore Engineering College in India), is an avid Lulu publisher and ambassador, and he disagrees with Edwards.

"Glasstree will give people a viable alternative to the unfair, exploitative opportunities offered by traditional academic publishers."

Edwards is also concerned about quality control, pointing to the expertise required in academic publishing.

"Given the nature of these titles, specialized skills are required to produce books that meet the expectations of a specialized group of readers - in this case academics, librarians, researchers," she says.

"The human and financial resources that university presses bring to publishing projects are significant, and given the small market for many scholarly works in Canada, the value they bring to is something that prospective authors are wise to consider."

Though many traditional publishing services are built into Glasstree's modernized pricing model and marketed as complimentary, some services do come at a supplementary cost. Academics who choose to access additional services - such as book editing, translation, peer review and marketing assistance - pay extra. And because autonomy is handed over to the academic, it's possible that they may spend more time and energy on intricate publishing details, a responsibility typically entrusted to a publisher.

"We are constantly engaging with our academic ambassadors to ensure that the tool we are developing is what they want. Glasstree [is] an academic-centric publishing site that continues to evolve as the needs of academics around the world evolve."

Glasstree also aims to advance the open access movement. There's a growing sense within academia that new information and ideas should be free and accessible to everyone. Though many on campus see the value of open access, they can find it difficult to make their work widely available due to the costs of traditional publishing.

Glasstree touts an affordable option for academics who are seeking to join the open access movement. Glasstree promotes an opportunity that differs from its competitors'. Its website states that it provides "a repository for low price Open Access dissemination." In dollar figures, academics are looking at roughly $4,000 USD to publish via open access on their platform. Glasstree's website says a comparable package with a traditional publishing company could cost in the ballpark of $10,000 to $15,000 USD for a typical monograph.

According to Glasstree, this price point doesn't mean a shortfall in services. Glasstree's open access publishing bundle includes a double-blind peer review, a manuscript assessment, copy editing, ISBN and DOI and bibliometrics tracking (via Kudos).

Competing trends like the open access movement – coupled with challenges within academia relating to shrinking opportunities for tenure, shifting funding priorities and the perceived pressure to publish consistently – could very well be the reason why subdivisions like Glasstree now exist.

Time will tell if Glasstree's publishing model will disrupt the sector, providing a heightened sense of control and a larger paycheque for academics, or if it's just another self-publishing company that's strategically disguised itself as a transfer of autonomy.